New Spending Confidence Index Makes Consumers Focus of the Equation

June 6, 2016 - Prosper Insights & Analytics™ and MacroSavvy™ LLC have collaborated in the development of the Spending Confidence Index™, a less volatile index of consumer confidence/sentiment. This new measure integrates psychological and behavioral factors that affect spending and is valuable for all who wish to predict personal consumption.

The new index and its components are especially valuable for predicting spending at a category level. The index provides a new tool for category analysis and is part of a broader category toolkit that will result from the collaboration between Prosper and MacroSavvy.

"The more traditional confidence measures are hurt by month-to-month volatility," said Frank Badillo, Director of Research, MacroSavvy™. "Academic articles have identified the weakness being the result of consumer questions about distant and ambiguous issues, such as 'business conditions.'"

The Spending Confidence Index™ solves this issue by incorporating data from direct questions that probe personal consumption expectations at a category level while eliminating the more ambiguous questions about business conditions. The result is a more consumer-centered and less unstable sentiment measure relevant to business analysts and investors in the retail sector and consumer goods space.

Nineteen specific questions on future purchase intentions for various product categories have been fielded to over 700,000 consumers over the past nine years. These responses inform the index, which performs as a macroeconomic indicator without any of the current ambiguity issues. The index captures underlying trends of existing measures of consumer sentiment. It also identifies high and low points and periods of confidence.

In addition to the 19 subcategories, the index is also compiled for consumables vs. discretionary goods, as well as six other category aggregates: (1) Apparel & Shoes, (2) Drugs, Health & Beauty Care, (3) Electronics, (4) Food & Groceries, (5) Homegoods, and (6) Leisure Goods.

"Against this backdrop, the Spending Confidence Index™ by Prosper and MacroSavvy™ represents a significant step forward. It is a much stronger measure of confidence that is not hampered by month-to-month volatility, which limits the usefulness of other existing measures of confidence," said Badillo.

For more information on the Spending Confidence Index™, click here.

MacroSavvy™
MacroSavvy provides insights about the big-picture trends-economic, demographic, or other macro-level forces-that matter to businesses and households. MacroSavvy distinguishes the important from the less important trends to help individuals make better everyday decisions in their work life and home life. The firm is led by Frank Badillo, Director of Research. Frank has been a trusted adviser to Fortune 500 companies for more than 20 years. As an applied economist, Frank has shown a proven ability to reconcile macro trends, helping clients understand key factors shaping household behavior nationally as well as globally. www.macrosavvy.com

Prosper Insights & Analytics™
Prosper Insights & Analytics provides advanced business intelligence using sophisticated analytical software to examine big datasets and provide answers to executives via its cloud-based InsightCenter™ platform powered by Prosper Technologies. By integrating a variety of data including economic, behavioral and attitudinal data, Prosper Insights & Analytics delivers insights for executive decision making. Further, it is continually identifying unique insights through analytics to enable marketers to make knowledge-based decisions rather than relying on intuition. To learn more: www.ProsperDiscovery.com

Contact:
Chrissy Wissinger, Director, Communications
chrissy@goProsper.com

Stacie Nelson, Client Services & Marketing Director
stacie@goProsper.com
614-846-0146

Rick McClure, Business Development
Rick@macrosavvy.com
614-403-3486